


Trivium

by Violsva



Series: In a State of Marriage [1]
Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Book: The Sign of the Four, F/M, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Pre-OT3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-16 05:44:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3476666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Violsva/pseuds/Violsva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beginnings, or, Rhetoric, Grammar, and Logic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trivium

**Author's Note:**

> Allegedly March 3rd is National Threesome Day, so here is something of a prequel to [Overwhelming](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3351851).

I told myself that I was merely imagining the tension between Holmes and me in the hansom. I told myself that we would return home as usual, perhaps have a drink, although really I felt too exhausted for that, go to our separate bedrooms, and sleep, alone. We’d both exerted ourselves beyond our usual limits, physically and mentally, and would need it.

I told myself that I’d dreamed anything that might be haunting my memories, and that there was nothing between us but friendship. I was normal, and he, although eccentric, was celibate, and we left the cab together, unlocked and reclosed the front door, ascended our seventeen steps, and closed our sitting room door behind us quite as usual.

And then his hand touched my arm, and mine landed on his shoulder, and he was cupping the back of my head and I kissed him and he pulled me towards him, his back against the wall. His mouth was hard and opening and I leaned up into it, and he pressed me against him with a hand on my backside. My prick had sprung into life as soon as he touched me.

I didn’t pull back, not to suggest that we move to a bed, not to ask him for anything, not even to say his name as his hand clenched wonderfully in my hair. I wanted to stop thinking entirely. No doubt he wanted the same.

*

Dr. Watson kept me informed of where they were in their investigation. He looked at me in a way I wanted to believe was more than friendly, and he came to talk to me nearly every day. I asked questioned and admired Mr. Holmes’ brilliance with him and tried to ignore Mrs. Forrester’s knowing looks.

He was so loyal to his friend, and so captivated by him, as captivated as I was by his stories. He worked to understand Mr. Holmes’ ideas, and laughed when he admitted that he hardly ever managed it, and he was so good and bright and caring and bold as anything below it all.

And Mr. Holmes when I did see him was a blinding star. One did not want to look directly at him – though Dr. Watson could and did, freely and easily – but his light was intoxicating. And the doctor obviously thought so as well.

I thought about the two of them more than I should. Dr. Watson was kind and dependable and liked me and if I were growing enamoured of him, as Mrs. Forrester clearly thought, it would be only natural. But it was not just him. I thought of him with Mr. Holmes. I wanted to see them working together in an investigation, as I had not been able to at Sholto’s. I wanted Mr. Holmes to sit by the fire with the doctor and I, explaining his thought processes. He had this way of looking at Dr. Watson, a more hidden version of the doctor’s obvious admiration for him, and I was not sure that Dr. Watson saw it. But I could not take him away from it.

I wanted them both, I realized one night, my face flushing though I was alone in the room. I didn’t know how I could have them, but I wanted them both. They were inseparable.

*

She’d approached me first, and I hadn’t been able to see why.

“Watson would be far more receptive,” I had said, when I had at last figured out what she was asking of me. “Talk to him. You are attractive and intelligent, he will certainly -”

“But don’t you see, Mr. Holmes,” she interrupted, “I can’t talk to him without first talking to you.”

I couldn’t understand it.

Watson’s admiration for Miss Morstan had been evident. Hers was as well, but oddly ... broad, her bright eyes flashing between the two of us whenever we were together, her gaze following Watson’s while I was at my work and trying to ignore them both, her compliments and smiles directed at the pair of us together.

But I had no interest in women, however singular she might be among them, or any kind of romance, and she was quite smart enough to see that, and I had assumed she would set her attentions solely on Watson once she had. And then – he would no doubt find her wholehearted affection far more appealing than my own unpredictable desires, and he _deserved_ it. If I lost him to her I would at least know that he had what he ought to have. All he had ever had from me were secretive midnight caresses and silence.

But here she was, insisting that our partnership – which she could not know the half of – was more important than the straightforward marriage she must have always expected, which was now clearly attainable.

“I know how important you both are to each other,” she said – simple enough words, but I nearly gasped in shock at her tone.

It was all her idea, right from the start. I would have willingly – not happily – given Watson up; or if she had not come into our lives no doubt we would have continued for years as we were, not letting ourselves admit that the other was anything but a friend, a partner, and a ready hand in the darkness.


End file.
